Napoleon wrote:A little off-topic, but did you know that every US president is related to Charlemagne? Weird, huh?

Yeah... sure. In the same way every potentate in the Arabian world is related to Mohammed.

And, surprise, I got ancestors in the middle ages, too! We owned some stuff then. And every single person in my family tree survived the 30-Year-War! And the Black Plague! (At least they all survived long enough to conceive offspring that survived.)

ByeJojo

This is just the sort of nonsense up with which I will not put.Winston Churchill

My family had a few as well. I was really excited to hear we had a castle. When I lived in Great Britain I decided to visit it.... so I started doing some research and found a picture of it.... a lovely green mound in a big green field. Hope they fired the caretaker!

[quote="Napoleon"]Yeah, but this one was won in the [b]BATTLE OF HASTINGS,[/b] That means, that without my ancestors bravery, England might never have existed. That means the U.S. would never have existed. Probably you or me would not exist, and if we did, we would probably be Spanish. Who would have controlled Spain and France? Sweden? Maybe...but maybe not...If I remember correctly, Austria was British-backed, and without England, Austria might have fallen to the Turks. Woah, talk about food for thought.[/quote]

Can I just say that England already existed under Anglo-Saxon rule. Also you either could have been Norman or Anglo-Saxon, Normandy was seperate to France, it had been conquered by the Vikings a couple of centuries earlier. Let me tell you something in History we will never know what might have happened if things have not happened, we can only ask "What if".

There can be no triumph without loss,no victory without suffering,no freedom without sacrifice.

According to my Grandfather, I come from a long and distinguished line of sheep theives. Given that my ancestory is predominantly English I can only assume that my ancestors were probably robbing your ancestors blind .

Napoleon wrote:A little off-topic, but did you know that every US president is related to Charlemagne? Weird, huh?

Yeah... sure. In the same way every potentate in the Arabian world is related to Mohammed.

I think its even more insidious than that. I've done a lot of genealogy work over the years and it would appear that anyone who has family connections to a European "noble" family, which virtually everyone does, also has a connection to Charlemagne. I think there was some "cooking of the books" in the noble's family histories.

let me think...my several greats grandfather made yellow margerine legal. even further back I had a reletive who was a train robber but thats as far back as I know

He who thinks you should look at the box that says "Quaraga" if you want to find out his username (about as useful to you as his real name). he only wants you to look so he can laugh about you looking there because he's a total smart...

quaraga wrote:let me think...my several greats grandfather made yellow margerine legal. even further back I had a reletive who was a train robber but thats as far back as I know

Margarine was illegal?

At one time, margarine was illegal in some places, such as Canada and New Zealand. I think, however, that the emphasis in Hound Knight's statement should be on 'yellow' because even in those places where margarine was not illegal, it was illegal to make it appear to be like butter.

"Butter's meanest punches in the battle with the upstart [margarine] began as early as 1902 in the United States, even before hydrogenation technology became available. Margarine was called a 'harmful drug,' and stores had to be licensed to sell it. Butter producers primly and cunningly insisted that, since margarine was not butter, it should be prevented by every means from resembling butter. Above all, it should be denied the golden colour which, as butter had good reason to know, proves irresistible to buyers, no matter what the substance actually tastes like. Unless it wanted to bear a heavy tax, margarine had to be sold lard-white. Five of the states went so far as to have all margarine dyed pink, presumably so that no one could take it seriously, let alone eat it as a daily basic food or cook anything in it without turning the stomachs of their family and guests." (Margaret Visser, Much Depends on Dinner, HarperCollins, 2008, page 107)

If you're interested in more about the fight between producers of butter and margarine, I highly recommend the chapter 'Butter--And Something "Just as Good"' in the above cited book. It's fascinating, and Visser is a wonderful author.

I'm late to this thread but just wanted to say that I think that's pretty cool. With my ancestry, we don't really know anything prior to them coming to the United States - mostly in the late 1800's, but there is one branch of the family that literally goes back to the Mayflower (if you've read about the Pilgrims, you may recall the story of one guy who got swept overboard when he went up on deck during a storm - yep, that idiot is one of my ancestors). Since all of my other ancestors came over here and started farming, we pretty much assume they were poor farmers in the Netherlands, Bohemia and England. My wife's great-great grandfather was a samurai, so she's got some cooler stuff in her background.

I'm late to this thread but just wanted to say that I think that's pretty cool. With my ancestry, we don't really know anything prior to them coming to the United States - mostly in the late 1800's, but there is one branch of the family that literally goes back to the Mayflower (if you've read about the Pilgrims, you may recall the story of one guy who got swept overboard when he went up on deck during a storm - yep, that idiot is one of my ancestors). Since all of my other ancestors came over here and started farming, we pretty much assume they were poor farmers in the Netherlands, Bohemia and England. My wife's great-great grandfather was a samurai, so she's got some cooler stuff in her background.

Bruce

I do remember that pilgrim that went overboard! That's neat, as is the samurai.

"I can avoid being seen if I wish, but to disappear entirely, that is a rare gift."

Somehow, my paternal grandmother's (that's actually the last link that I'm sure of, though I think her mother was a Stewart) line can trace back to the Stewart monarchs of England and Scotland around the 14th and 15th century. Somehow that line came down to Cornish tin miners who came to mine gold in the California gold rush.

And my maternal grandmother's (again that's the last link that I'm sure of) line goes back to an English Knight who took the name Kyte after a kite (hawk) landed on his shield before a battle). Somehow that line came down to Kansas farmers who came west (think Grapes or Wrath, only they left from Kansas, not Oklahoma).

But we don't own anything cool like a castle. But I'm at least part royalty. And, if there is some crazy accident like in that movie King Ralph, you could be talking to King Stephen I.

I have a few ancestors that travelled on the Mayflower (Bruce, my ancestors were probably laughing at yours ). Several generations later, Moses Fuller faught in the revolutinary war. We still have the musket he used at the battle of Bunker Hill.

Moses's grand daughter, Sarah Fuller, would go on to be famous. There is a lot Ican tell, but I'll put it in a nutshell. She was Principal of the Horace-Mann School for the Deaf for almost 50 years. It was her who taught Hellen Keller to speak her first sentance, "It is warm." After a few lessons from Sarah, Anne Sullivan took over. Helen and Sarah enjoyed some corrosponadce wiht each other.

Sarah was also very good friends with Alexander Graham Bell. She had very frequent corospondance with hher, and hw would often visit her to work on the telephone where she lived with her sister.

The closest any of my ancestors have ever come to owning a castle is Symond Fiske, who owned a manor. He was entitled to his own coat of arms. His great grandaughter is said to have been the grandmother of John Locke.

I have one more story for you. Owen Fitzpen was a young, adventurous lad who got caught in the tail end of the Ottoman Wars. He was captured by Turkish Pirates in March 24, 1620. For seven years he and several other Christian Captians were held as slaves in Algiers, Algeria. They recieved a chance to escape when he and ten other Dutch and French captives were herded aboard a corsair with 65 Turks. Owen and his ten comrades faught for three hours before the surviving Turks surrendered; 5 of Owen's friends were dead.

The group (with Owen as their captian) set off for Cartagene, Spain. News of his endvaour went all the way to the king of Spain. Owen was summonded to Madrid where he was offered a Captian's position and great favour; however, there was a catch (there always is ). Owen would have to convert to Catholicism, which he did not want to do. Owen respectfully declined, sold the ship for 6,000 pounds sterling, and retirned to England.

I could fill a book full of stories (one of my cousins has). Those are the ones I thought you would find most interesting.

As long as we're all bragging anyway, my ancestors were viking-era Scandinavians. They could have raided the land all around your castle before it was even there- but since they were Norwegians, they were probably too busy discovering important places like Iceland, Greenland and Vinland (that little bit of North America, dontcha know).

To me all my ancestors come from scandinavian countries, but i do suspect i have an spanish and irish ancestor or two...So all i can say is that my ancestry have been sailing ships and stuff for about 1000 years...And Napoleon congrats about the castle. You should think about visiting.

CastleLord.

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